Husband engaged and having baby with mistress

[lawyerwife13]

Massachusetts
My husband announced 6 months ago he was leaving me and our children, I then discovered he had been having affair for past 6 months with a person he hired in his law office (yes he is lawyer). This person is on probation for felonies and served 3 years in jail and has been out a year. It gets worse... I was forced to vacate maritial home because he did not pay morgage for past year, and now he lives with her she is 7 months pregnant with I assume his baby and they just got engaged neither of us has filed for divorce. I am at a loss on what to do he has all the money and resources I have 4 kids and am now working 3 jobs to just cover food and basics. What should I do? I have talked to lawyers in past but have no money to retain and they wont take my case with money!!

 

[Just Blue]

Massachusetts
My husband announced 6 months ago he was leaving me and our children, I then discovered he had been having affair for past 6 months with a person he hired in his law office (yes he is lawyer). This person is on probation for felonies and served 3 years in jail and has been out a year. It gets worse... I was forced to vacate maritial home because he did not pay morgage for past year, and now he lives with her she is 7 months pregnant with I assume his baby and they just got engaged neither of us has filed for divorce. I am at a loss on what to do he has all the money and resources I have 4 kids and am now working 3 jobs to just cover food and basics. What should I do? I have talked to lawyers in past but have no money to retain and they wont take my case with money!!

File for divorce and child support. You can do this Pro Se.

 

[mistoffolees]

File for divorce and child support. You can do this Pro Se.

Or file for divorce and let the state child support enforcement agency set up a child support order. One way or the other, make sure you get the child support order filed before the other baby is born. If his mistress has the baby and files for child support first, your child would probably get less.

BTW, your husband is not engaged. Legally, that's not possible. He may THINK he's engaged, but until he's divorced, he can't promise to marry someone else. Not that it really matters.

 

[nextwife]

Obviously, Mistress really doesn't let little details like marriage get in the way of starting a family and planning a life with this married man.

 

[not2cleverRed]

Obviously, Mistress really doesn't let little details like marriage get in the way of starting a family and planning a life with this married man.

Nor, apparently, does the married man.

OP should enter the words:
massachusetts pro se divorce
into the search engine of her choice.

While I do not believe, given the assets and the existence of children, that a DIY divorce is the way to go in this case, at the very least it would give OP a heads up on what direction she should be heading in. (Like she has so much time to take up law in between the 3 jobs and kids.)

mistofelles has an excellent point about making sure that your children have first priority in any child support order.

Shall we assume that his practice is in a small office without scads of partners? Because wouldn't having an affair with a subordinate open up the office to all sorts of liability problems, should the new relationship go south? Not to mention the issue of ethics...

 

[ecmst12]

Or, you can hire a lawyer and ask that he pay your attorney fees. You should be able to get a free or low-cost consult to inquire about this possibility.

 

[mistoffolees]

Or, you can hire a lawyer and ask that he pay your attorney fees. You should be able to get a free or low-cost consult to inquire about this possibility.

Not only CAN, but SHOULD hire an attorney. STBX will certainly know his rights.

Your attorney should look into:
- Full property division. 50% of everything (more if you put him through law school)
- Full division of marital portion of any retirement assets.
- stbx forced to reimburse you for any marital assets he has squandered on his new GF
- You may be entitled to a portion of any ownership stake in his law practice
- Alimony if you are entitled to it.
- And, of course, child support.

For all of those, your attorney will want to subpoena every shred of financial information that he can to ensure that stbx isn't hiding assets.